Barcelona Continued

(TROY) I slept straight through the night, although Arden and Sawney didn't quite get the sleep they were hoping for. We woke up later than expected (10:00 or so) and went down for breakfast. We quickly realized that this country doesn't believe in breakfast either, as our "breakfast" at the hostel consisted of bread slices, ham and cheese, some watermelon slices, some OJ, and some milk. After eating not eating a real dinner, we were quite hungry. I realized that the lady at the front desk was staring at me after I had eaten my fourth watermelon slice, and decided to slow down. She also had to refill the orange juice pitcher on my behalf. I also ate 2 (tiny) muffins. I kept going a little longer due to the lack of food we had experienced, but stopped shy of actually not feeling hungry any more. Arden was a trooper though - he ate less than I did. Sawney was still asleep.

Once finished, we woke her up (she had coffee and one small muffin) and headed to a mansion/garden maze. It had been converted to a park and we were ready to explore it. It was a beautiful place, but the maze garden left something to be desired. It is an awesome concept, but government control had taken its toll on the artwork. The bottoms of many of the bushes were barren of leaves, and you could see through much of the maze. The private sector would have done a much better job (because, capitalism).

We left the park and went to try and find something to eat. There was nothing. Apparently, the few restaurants that exist in this country, close after breakfast (which is somewhere between 10 and noon) and then don't open up again until dinner.

(Sawney) Verizon has a $10 travel pass that has been invaluable. For 10 dollars we can use GPS, call home, use the internet etc. (the car rental wanted 7 dollars a day for GPS). We have used that travel pass to its full extent. Since we couldn't find a place to eat on our own, I googled! I found a place that was supposed to have some of the best tapas in the areas (not impressed) but Arden and Troy ate sandwiches and I had crochets, I was not very hungry with the blazing heat. We walked to a near by market and everything was closed... we didn't realize it was 2 o'clock. Everything is closed from about 1pm to 8 pm (unless you are in a touristy area). Online said their lunch time was 3 pm but it is hard to find a place serving food. Spain is in an artificial time zone so their meal times are very late. It is light outside until 10:30 pm to 11 pm. At 9 pm is looks like it is 5:30 pm back home. 

On to the cathedral! We drove to the gothic quarter of Barcelona (my favorite part of Barcelona). We drove aimlessly for a while until we found a parking garage near the water. We walked to the Barcelona Cathedral (Beautiful!). It was a pretty good walk there. At this point I realize we have been out in the sun far too long for me and my white skin so I walked into a couple pharmacies to get sunscreen… sunscreen is super expensive here. I couldn’t find it for less than 20 euro. Granted we were in a big city. We roamed around the streets in the gothic quarter for probably 2 hours. Small streets with the building close together - the images that come to mind when you think of Spain. Stores filled with hanging cured meat were everywhere. Troy and I stopped for ice cream at a little shop we spotted then we headed back to our car. Driving is crazy in the city and Troy is the only one able to drive the car because he is 25 and the car is stick shift. We headed back to our hostel (my and Arden’s first time staying in a hostel). We hung out at the hostel until we decided to wander around outside for food. We left at probably 8:30 – 9 o’clock. After our adventure the day before trying to order food and being too early, I created a plan to figure out if a restaurant was serving food, the ‘see if people are eating food and not just drinking’ plan. We walked around for a while and realized places weren’t serving food. We tried a place the day before and they told us they only served food in the middle of the day (in Spanish). We have not run into many people that speak English. We went to a grocery store and got a couple water bottles. As Arden would say ‘we had a deep breath for dinner’ (and cheez-its).










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